Note 545 — Chapter LVI

We must mention the names of the ladies who during the previous two or three years had been most active in speaking and organizing societies. So many meetings had been held that there was hardly a town of any importance in England, Ireland or Scotland where the principles of woman suffrage had not been explained and canvassed. One of the foremost for her activity in this department of work was Miss Mary Beedy, an American lady, resident for some years in England. She had thoroughly mastered the legal and political condition of the question in this country, and her untiring energy, her clear common sense, and her ready logic made her advocacy invaluable. The regret was general when she was compelled to return to America. Miss Helena Downing, niece of Mr. McCarthy Downing, member of parliament for Cork, arranged and gave many lectures during 1873 and 1874. Miss. Lillias Ashworth, honorary secretary of the Bristol committee, frequently spoke at meetings about this time. In Scotland Miss Jane Taylour and others still continued their indefatigable labors, in which they were frequently assisted by Miss Isabella Stuart of Balgonie in Fifeshire. In Ireland, in addition to the usual meetings in the north, a series of meetings in the south was undertaken by Miss Tod, Miss Beedy and Miss Downing. Other meetings were addressed by Miss Fawcett, Miss Becker, Miss Caroline Biggs, Miss Eliza Sturge, Miss Rhoda Garrett, Mrs. Fenwick-Miller and many others. During 1873 Mrs. Henry Kingsley, sister-in-law of one novelist and wife of another, also spoke frequently. Space fails me to do justice to the varied powers of the speakers who have carried our movement on during these years of patient perseverance; to the clear logic and convincing power of Mrs. Fawcett's speeches; to the thrilling eloquence of her cousin, Rhoda Garrett, now, alas! no longer with us; to Miss Becker's accurate legal knowledge and masterly presentation of facts and arguments; to Miss Helena Downing's eloquence marked by the humor, pathos and power which were hers by national inheritance. During these years of trial, too, the cause owed much to the strenuous advocacy of the Misses Ashworth, Anne Frances and Lillias Sophia, nieces of Jacob Bright. Miss Ashworth did not herself speak at meetings, but she comforted and helped those who did, while Lillias possessed the family gift of eloquence and charmed her audience by her witty, forcible and telling speeches. So numerous and so well attended have been these meetings during these and subsequent years, that it is impossible to exonerate men and women from the charge of willful blindness if they still misconstrue the plain facts of the question.